Delicous has managed to destroy itself in a single day. That's impressive by any standards, but I really think that they've done it. Users are complaining that they can't log in, and then when they do they're finding missing tags, no RSS feeds, the search function has been wrecked, tag bundles have disappeared, and that's just for starters. What do we get in return? Something called 'stacks' which are not interesting, novel or indeed new. At all. Plenty of other people have been doing them for ages.
The Delicious page over at Facebook is where most people are venting their spleen, and I've yet to see one complimentary comment. I really didn't think it would be possible to screw a service up that badly so quickly, but the new owners have managed it with stunning success. If you're looking for an alternative, and didn't jump ship last year, my blog post back then provides 28 alternatives to Delicious - I'll be going thru them to make sure that they still all work, but it's there in the meantime. I've had diigo as a backup for the last year, and I moved across today, lock stock and barrel. I suggest that you look around yourself!
Ah, this is why I switched as soon as Delicious went out for sale. Been happily using Pinboard since then. Good luck.
Posted by: Kenley Neufeld | September 28, 2011 at 04:24 AM
Just looked into my delicious account - what a disaster indeed :-(
As for looking for alternatives: Some advice how to move links to another platform may be helpful.
Anyway, thank you for your post - it prepared me to the shocking condition my delicious account looks like
Posted by: Inforator | September 28, 2011 at 07:38 AM
I moved to Diigo around two years ago and have encountered no real problems. The special interest groups I have joined there have proved very useful. Hardly a day goes by when they don't offer up a gem of professional interest. See some useful groups here: http://groups.diigo.com/user/aredontour
Posted by: Anthony Beal | September 28, 2011 at 09:27 AM
From my point of view Delicious is still working. I can log on, I can save links and tag them (using the same Firefox add-on as before), and the RSS feed I am using in my blog is still there.
Posted by: Ole Husby | September 28, 2011 at 09:42 AM
I have to admit that I decamped to Diigo - thanks to your recommendation, Phil - a year ago, and it seems fine to me.
Posted by: Nina Chachu | September 28, 2011 at 12:06 PM
Thanks for your post of suggestions of alternatives to Delicious. Luckily I exported by Bookmarks from Delicious last week as I saw there was some change in T&Cs which I wasn't happy about and exported just in case. I'll take a look at diigo you suggested!
Thanks
Posted by: Anneli | September 28, 2011 at 01:20 PM
Like a fool I trusted that the new owners would keep it pretty much as it was. Now I would like to move over to another platform, but how do I get my bookmarks out? And are any of my lovely tag bundles still in existence?
Posted by: Liz Mallett | September 28, 2011 at 02:55 PM
Liz - you can export your bookmarks, and import them into other packages such as Diigo. Log into Delicious, go to Settings, choose export and follow the onscreen prompts. You can import into Diigo by uploading the file. I've never used bundles, so can't help on that issue. - If you try it, let me know!
Posted by: Phil Bradley | September 28, 2011 at 03:36 PM
I think saying "destroy" is a bit melodramatic. Like any company that is taking over a product with proprietary code, AVOS is struggling to recode features. Have you read the status blog? Have you seen what they have fixed? What they plan to fix?
Admittedly, I think AVOS could have warned the users that this was coming. It was a shock to see the changes without any heads up.
Remember, Delicious is free for users. Would you complain that free water is in a bucket instead of china?
Posted by: Lesli M | September 29, 2011 at 06:53 PM
There are plenty of ways in which something can be destroyed, and one of the most dangerous is when people stop trusting the company or product, and that's what's happened here.
AVOS should have known what they were taking on, they should have coded it properly and *got it right* before messing around with users data. Yes, I've read their blog - very little mention is made of the problems that they've created for users. They shouldn't have to BE fixing things at this stage. Fix before it goes live, not after.
A motorway service station bathroom is free. I presume that you wouldn't therefore complain if it was in a mess and poorly maintained? Of course you would. Just because something is free does not mean we should accept substandard quality.
Posted by: Phil Bradley | September 29, 2011 at 07:42 PM
Can't actually read their blog unless I download a new browser which my IT dept. won't allow.
Posted by: Deb | September 29, 2011 at 11:24 PM
Problem with linking to diigo from our library homepage as I used to with delicious is that they use adverts- any other suggestion?
Posted by: cathy gale | October 04, 2011 at 09:25 AM
Cathy, I would suggest taking a look at the alternatives mentioned in the post to see if any of those match what you want. Alertnatively, diigo provides an RSS function, so you could use something like Feedinformer at http://feed.informer.com/ and pull your bookmarks back to your site. Or, pay out $20 a year for an ad free version. Finally, and I don't mean this in any way rudely or to trivialise your question because I think it's an important one, but tell your bosses to get over it. Adverts are what make the net run, and nobody cares about them any more. I can't think diigo is going to run any that are 'inappropriate' or NSFW.
Posted by: Phil Bradley | October 04, 2011 at 11:22 AM
Interesting comment Phil, about the adverts! (I had a similar problem with Pageflakes not so long ago)
Posted by: cathy gale | October 04, 2011 at 01:43 PM
Yes Cathy, I can agree with you 100% on the Pageflakes adverts - their decision to include singles and dating adverts with ladies leaving little to the imagination was one of the final nails for me with their service. I think diigo is rather more circumspect though.
Posted by: Phil Bradley | October 04, 2011 at 02:04 PM